Despite an uncertain beginning to its streaming life course, Hulu has announced it will renew How I Met Your Father for at least one more season that will feature twice as many episodes as the show's debut season.
Hulu's How I Met Your Father pilot premiered on January 18 as part of a two-episode release. A sequel to the hit sitcom How I Met Your Mother, which ran on CBS from 2004 to 2014, How I Met Your Father takes place in the exact same universe with characters from the new series even living in Ted, Marshall, and Lily’s former New York City apartment. At the time of writing, How I Met Your Father has released six episodes, although critical reception has been mostly lukewarm and quick to point out the show’s over reliance on nostalgia for the original.
Nevertheless, Hulu executives believe they have something special on their hands because How I Met Your Father is officially getting a second 20-episode season, which in itself is a rare extensive run for a streaming comedy series. Hulu's head of scripted content, Jordan Helman, was quite supportive of the show, giving a special shout-out to its lead actor and producer Hilary Duff for her work on the show. "Isaac and Elizabeth’s inspired vision for How I Met Your Father has proven to be true appointment viewing that fans cannot get enough of week to week," said Helman. "The lives of these characters, as portrayed by the immensely talented cast led by Hilary Duff, are just starting to unfold and we’re thrilled to bring more of this group’s journey to our viewers with a supersized second season."
How I Met Your Father does bring back How I Met Your Mother creators Carter Bays and Craig Thomas, now acting as executive producers, though they also had time to co-write the pilot episode. The possibility of them returning in that capacity in the future has not been ruled out. Duff's Sophie is joined by Francia Raisa (Valentina), Christopher Lowell (Jesse), Suraj Sharma (Sid), Tom Ainsley (Charlie), Tien Tran (Ellen Gilbert), and Kim Cattrall as future Sophie.
So far the How I Met Your Father seems keen to explore the same themes that made the original show one of the greatest sitcoms in recent memory, but it’s debatable whether a multi-camera comedy with pre-recorded laughs can still be successful in 2022. That said, it’s clear Hulu wants to give How I Met Your Father a shot by backing the show for at least one more year, with the company also eager to revive another hit like Futurama in the near future to add more content to a platform already brimming with great shows in all genres.
This is something the show’s creators have said to enjoy, as they’re no longer restricted to a specific number of episodes in the way sitcoms of old used to be. Thus, they have extra creative freedom over the pacing of Sophie's story, which is something even Bays and Thomas struggled with at some point when writing Ted's story.
How I Met Your Father episodes drop on Hulu each Tuesday.
Source: Hulu